Condign Punishment

Hubris offends those on high. Herodotus tells us that the Almighty loves to smite with his bolts only the bigger animals, those who exalt themselves.

Herodotus either knew physics or the mind of God, or both.

A couple of years ago, I got a small share of God's punishment for hubris. My house was struck by lightning.

Of course, I live in Central Florida, the lightning capital of the country, which gets electrical storms 90 days a year.

But, as Yossarian, of Catch-22 fame, said, “What difference does that make?”

The victim is always prone to exhibit the Nancy Kerrigan reaction: “Why me?”

On reflection, however, one should realize that lightning strikes are apt to become quite a bit more prevalent as the climate warms.

The resulting increase in atmospheric water vapor leads to more molecular friction and the greater chance that electrons will be torn free of their atomic confines at the base of clouds.

Cloud-to-ground strikes result when these electrons repel their brethren on the ground, creating a state in which a positively charged earth reaches out to the negatively charged cloud base.

Then the ambient air, which normally insulates, instead conducts.

In a sense, the earth embraces the fire and destruction that is the collateral and unintended consequence of man’s prior liberation of stored carbon.

And the strikes set up a feedback loop. Lightning causes forest fires which release still more carbon which contributes to further rises in temperature and a concomitant further increase in water vapor.

To argue that my strike was the Almighty’s special punishment is indeed hubristic.

But the increased incidence of strikes in Florida and elsewhere is clearly part of the reckoning that man must pay for crimes of collective commission against nature.

Small changes can create big effects. Just a few hundred extra parts per million of carbon in our atmosphere, and the reckoning can become insupportably large.